by Ian Donnis and Scott MacKay

Is East Providence the next Central Falls?

East Providence schools have run up a cumulative $6.3 million deficit over the past five years. Now, state officials, led by Rosemary Booth Gallogly, state revenue director, are trying to help city and school officials with a workout plan.

More than $4 million of the deficit is owed to Bradley Hospital, located in East Providence. Bradley has been the city’s special education provider and obviously ants to get paid for services rendered.

Gallogly says state officials are taking a keen interest in the city’s finances because the state doesn’t want the city of 50,000 to become the next Central Falls, which is in state receivership.

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East Providence has been unfortunately run by mostly a bunch of corrupt and/or incompetent fools for too many years now. Their grossly short-sighted & overall bad decisions of the past are coming back to haunt them now.

The current school budget deficit actually goes back to the last school committee, which was almost entirely voted out of office en masse last year. The East Providence Mayor & City Council haven’t helped things out by intentionally under-funding their school system & by engaging in bonehead dealings with various school & police related unions that have ended up costing East Providence way more money in legal & settlement costs than was originally “saved”. Word has it that a former East Providence building official was fired in recent years over trying to tell the proper authorities that at least the high school (if not more city-owned buildings) were unfit for human occupation.

The state of RI will NEVER take over another school system based on its experience with Central Falls.

“The current school budget deficit actually goes back to the last school committee, which was almost entirely voted out of office en masse last year.”

Nice try at revisionist history. The accumulated deficit took nearly 10 years to rack up, and was mainly a result of previous school committees and city councils making promises during that period to big labor unions that they knew they couldn’t keep in the long term. The last school committee tried it’s best to solve the structural budget problems, but unfortunately, they were taken out in the last election, primarily because they didn’t want to give away the candy store anymore.

“The last school committee tried it’s best to solve the structural budget problems, but unfortunately, they were taken out in the last election”

LOL…wow, the last school committee left East Providence with an over $5 Million deficit, which only increased recently, and that was AFTER they were voted out of office last November! Get a grip on reality man…